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Assessment of Water Quality, Eutrophication, and Zooplankton Community in Lake Burullus, Egypt

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Assessment of Water Quality, Eutrophication, and Zooplankton Community in Lake Burullus, Egypt diversity Article Assessment of Water Quality, Eutrophication, and Zooplankton Community in Lake Burullus, Egypt Ahmed E. Alprol 1, Ahmed M. M. Heneash 1, Asgad M. Soliman 1, Mohamed Ashour 1,* , Walaa F. Alsanie 2, Ahmed Gaber 3 and Abdallah Tageldein Mansour 4,5 1 National Institute of Oceanography and Fisheries, NIOF, Cairo 11516, Egypt; [email protected] (A.E.A.); [email protected] (A.M.M.H.); [email protected] (A.M.S.) 2 Department of Clinical Laboratories Sciences, The Faculty of Applied Medical Sciences, Taif University, P.O. Box 11099, Taif 21944, Saudi Arabia; [email protected] 3 Department of Biology, College of Science, Taif University, P.O. Box 11099, Taif 21944, Saudi Arabia; [email protected] 4 Animal and Fish Production Department, College of Agricultural and Food Sciences, King Faisal University, P.O. Box 420, Al-Ahsa 31982, Saudi Arabia; [email protected] 5 Fish and Animal Production Department, Faculty of Agriculture (Saba Basha), Alexandria University, Alexandria 21531, Egypt * Correspondence: [email protected] Abstract: Burullus Lake is Egypt’s second most important coastal lagoon. The present study aimed to shed light on the different types of polluted waters entering the lake from various drains, as well as to evaluate the zooplankton community, determine the physical and chemical characteristics of the waters, and study the eutrophication state based on three years of seasonal monitoring from Citation: Alprol, A.E.; Heneash, 2017 to 2019 at 12 stations. The results revealed that Rotifera, Copepoda, Protozoa, and Cladocera A.M.M. ; Soliman, A.M.; Ashour, M.; dominated the zooplankton population across the three-year study period, with a total of 98 taxa from Alsanie, W.F.; Gaber, A.; Mansour, 59 genera and 10 groups detected in the whole-body lake in 2018 and 2019, compared to 93 species A.T. Assessment of Water Quality, from 52 genera in 2017. Twelve representative surface water samples were collected from the lake to Eutrophication, and Zooplankton determine physicochemical parameters, i.e., temperature, pH, salinity, dissolved oxygen, biological Community in Lake Burullus, Egypt. oxygen demand, chemical oxygen demand, ammonia-N, nitrate–N, nitrate-N, total nitrogen, total Diversity 2021, 13, 268. https:// phosphorus, dissolved reactive phosphorus, and chlorophyll-a, as well as Fe, Cu, Zn, Cr, Ni, Cd, doi.org/10.3390/d13060268 and Pb ions. Based on the calculations of the water quality index (WQI), the lake was classified as having good water quality. However, the trophic state is ranked as hyper-eutrophic and high trophic Academic Editors: Boris A. Levin and conditions. Yulia V. Bespalaya Keywords: zooplankton community; marine pollution; water quality; eutrophication state; heavy Received: 29 April 2021 Accepted: 11 June 2021 metals; Burullus Lake Published: 15 June 2021 Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in 1. Introduction published maps and institutional affil- The Deltaic Mediterranean coastline of Egypt, especially the middle part, has economic iations. importance. From the west coast to the east coast, there are three Deltaic shallow lakes (Edku, Burullus, and Manzala Lakes). Burullus Lake is the second-largest natural lake in Egypt and is situated close to the Mediterranean Sea among the two main branches of the Nile. The importance of lakes as natural resources includes fish production, as they account Copyright: © 2021 by the authors. for more than 40% of the overall fish production in Egypt. As a result of anthropogenic Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. activity and pollution, its production has decreased to less than 12.22% now [1]. Burullus This article is an open access article Lake is one of a network of protected areas throughout Egypt, designated and managed distributed under the terms and by the Egyptian Environmental Affairs Agency. It is registered as a Ramsar site in 1998. conditions of the Creative Commons Additionally, Birdlife International has identified it as an important bird area (IBA) [2], due Attribution (CC BY) license (https:// to its importance for refuge, migratory foraging, and breeding of water birds [3]. It covers creativecommons.org/licenses/by/ an area of 410 km2 [4] of which 220 km2 are open water [5]. It is observable that the open 4.0/). Diversity 2021, 13, 268. https://doi.org/10.3390/d13060268 https://www.mdpi.com/journal/diversity Diversity 2021, 13, 268 2 of 23 water surface in the lake had reduced from 1092 km2 in 1801 [6] to 434.6 km2 in 1972 then reduced to 220 km2 in 2015 with a reduction of about 80.0% of the water area [5]. Coastal lakes are heavily influenced by anthropogenic activities from watersheds, as they receive inputs of freshwater and polluted waters containing organic and inorganic compounds from different sources [7]. These lakes collect massive amounts of drainage water from various drains around the Nile delta and connect to the Mediterranean Sea via El-Boughaz outlets [2]. Contamination of the marine environment is a major factor that poses a substantial threat to marine creatures’ survival [8]. Among the several pollutants, heavy metals are toxic, persistent, and abundant owing to their accumulation in the food chain and continued persistence in the ecosystem and their concentration increases through biomagnification [9]. The impacts of pollution have far-reaching consequences for public health, the economy, and the environment [10]. The process of eutrophication is driven by an increase in nutrients in the aquatic systems, particularly nitrogen and phosphorus in the ecosystem, which leads to an increase in primary production (photosynthesis) and an accumulation of organic matter in the lakes. In addition, silt from the drainage basins will accumulate over time, which makes the lake shallower and warmer. Eutrophication can also have a negative impact on the reservoir ecology as well as the natural stability of the lake, affecting practically all of the biological communities and their interactions in the water body [11]. Under natural conditions, the rate of this process is very slow and it takes hundreds or thousands of years. Zooplankton are aquatic species with poor swimming abilities that float in the water column of ocean, seas, or freshwater bodies to travel for long distances [8,12,13]. Zooplank- tons are important in the ecosystem because they connect the primary production and the higher levels, monitoring water quality, pollution, and the state of eutrophication [14,15]. In addition, zooplankton play an important role in the natural cycle of carbon and other elements in the sea [16]. On the other hand, zooplankton are the main suitable feeds for larval stages of many fish and shellfish species in marine hatcheries [8,12]. Seasonal zooplankton movement and the factors driving their inconstancy are very sensitive to changes in ecological variables, particularly in shallow, semi-enclosed inlets with densely populated shores, where increasing anthropogenic nutrient input has a serious influence on marine communities [17,18]. Monitoring of water quality is the first step that can lead to management and conservation of aquatic ecosystems. The chemical and physical factors influencing the marine environment include temperature, pH, salinity, dissolved oxygen, biological oxygen demand, chemical oxygen demand, nutrients, reactive phosphate, heavy metal pollutants, and others. These parameters are considered the most limiting factors affecting the survival and growth of aquatic organisms [19–21]. Poor water quality could be produced via low aquatic flow, municipal discharges, and wastewater effluents [22]. In this study, Burullus Lake was chosen because of its economic importance in Egypt, based on its various uses and surroundings, such as tourism, fisheries activity, nutrient enrichment, and industrial water sources, among others. Furthermore, any noticeable change in water quality has an impact on the health, structure, and growth of the fish population, so this paper aims to determine most of the parameters related to water quality and identify the major sources of pollution in Burullus Lake, Egypt over the course of three years, from 2017–2019, in conjunction with the study of eutrophication state and an assessment of potential ecological concerns. In addition, it aims to assess the community, occurrence, diversity, and abundance of zooplankton in Burullus Lake. Moreover, the current study will be a useful tool in assisting decision makers and authorities in charge for sustainable marine management and increasing the lake production. 2. Materials and Methods 2.1. Study Area and Sampling Burullus Lake is located at (30◦220–31◦350 N; 30◦330–31◦080 E) with an area of about 460 km2, length of about 47 km, and width ranges between 6 and 16 km. It has an irregular elongated shape with 0.4–2.5 m depth. The lake receives seawater through a long canal Diversity 2021, 13, 268 3 of 23 (Boughaz El-Burullus) that connects the lake to the sea. Fresh water enters the lake through 8 drains and 1 freshwater canal. The lake is divided into 3 basins; eastern, middle, and western. It is situated on the eastern port of Rosetta side of the River Nile. Water samples were collected seasonally for the period from winter 2017 to autumn 2019 in sterile containers and maintained in an icebox on the site. A total of 12 surface water samples were collected from 12 sites representing different environmental habitats. Information of the sampling sites with their latitude and longitude are presented in Table1 and Figure1. 2.2. Methods Analyses of the physicochemical parameters of collected water samples were in- vestigated according to the standard methods APHA [23] to estimate various factors, such as biological oxygen demand (BOD), chemical oxygen demand (COD), ammonia-N, nitrate–N, nitrate-N, total nitrogen, dissolved reactive phosphorus, total phosphorus, and chlorophyll-a (Chlo-a). Water temperature was determined by a mercury thermometer. The concentration of hydrogen ion (pH) was determined by pH meter Model 59003-20 USA.
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